3 Building Blocks of a Successful Marketing Campaign
Creating a marketing campaign that will increase brand awareness involves a lot of moving parts working together as one. Coordinating these diverse components is one of the biggest challenges facing online marketers, but with some preliminary research and planning, you can assemble a campaign that will target qualified leads and increase your number of website visitors and subscribers while eliminating unnecessary content and wasted effort. Here are the most important foundations of digital marketing success.
Research
Conducting research ahead of time will prevent you from wasting resources on unprofitable modes of outreach. First, determine what makes your product or service unique among competitors—this is your “unique selling proposition.” Finding customers who will respond positively to your USP is the key to focusing your digital marketing campaign. Use the information you gather to create buyer personas, or characteristics shared by your target market.
For example, if your company provides loans for small businesses, you might create a buyer persona profile for the customers you are targeting: young, college-educated entrepreneurs who are interested in alternatives to traditional bank loans. More in-depth profiles might include goals, concerns, the industry they work in and preferences regarding content. Quizzes and surveys aimed at social media followers can help you refine your personas, as can social media listening.
Clear Objectives
In order to achieve a goal, you first have to figure out what it is. “Increase website traffic” is a good place to start, but this is only part of an overall digital marketing strategy intended to grow conversion rates over time. Start by creating a list of measurable goals you would like to achieve and determining which areas to focus on. Maybe you’re trying to acquire new customers, or are more interested in maintaining brand loyalty or increasing brand awareness.
Next, set a goal such with a time frame such as, “increase email subscribers by 25% this year.” Decide how much of your marketing budget you are willing to spend on this objective, and begin planning a content marketing strategy tailored to getting website visitors to subscribe to your email list.
Effective Promotion
Once you have created high-value content that will resonate with your target buyer personas, it’s time to make sure they have the opportunity to see it. Organic search results will draw some readers if you have made sure that all content includes relevant keywords and is optimized for SEO, but that is only the beginning.
New pieces of content such as videos, blog articles and eBooks must be promoted through channels designed to bring them to the attention of qualified buyers. If you are hoping to reach a professional audience, consider using LinkedIn to let them know about your new blog. Trying to bring millennial customers to your bakery? Consider a YouTube video demonstrating cake decorating techniques. Not just the content, but the channel you use to promote it, should be uniquely suited to the desired audience. Know the pros and cons of each marketing channel and proceed accordingly